


Payback is a bitch.

by Bee_choes



Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Aftermath of Violence, All characters except for TommyInnit and Dream are only mentionned tbh, Angry TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Angst, Author Is Sleep Deprived, Because I can, Blood and Gore, Can you tell i spent my wednesday evening writing this instead of studying?, Canon-Typical Violence, Child Death, Dead TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Depressed TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Depression, Dream SMP Ensemble Angst, Emotional Manipulation, Gen, Ghost TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I don't know what else to tag, I just couldn't figure out how to tag that lol, It turned dark really quickly lmaooo, Mentioned Dream SMP Ensemble, Pandora's Vault Prison, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sad TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Self-Hatred, Swearing, The Author Regrets Nothing, This was meant to be light, Trauma, Unreliable Narrator, first fic, i do not know how to tagTM, i told you it got dark fast lol, no i do not take constructive criticism, tw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-03
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-16 19:21:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29829702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bee_choes/pseuds/Bee_choes
Summary: « NOW THAT INTERSTATE IS PAVED WITH MEMORIES-»« Do you ever fucking shut up ??!! »Tommy continues, pretending not to hear.« OF A PAST LIFE I LIVED WHEN I WAS EIGHTEEN-not that you know, I ever got to be eighteen- »Dream glares at him. Tommy grins, an evil glint in his eyes, and keeps going.« AND EVERY WINTER I THINK OF WHAT WE USED TO BE-»If he could, Tommy is sure that Dream would kill him. But the thing is-The thing is that Tommy is already dead. He died in this very same cell that Dream is still stuck in, at the hands of that very same man.And truly, what else can he do but spend his time as a ghost driving the man who killed him to insanity and back?(Or alternatively: Tommy is dead and is now a confused and vengeful ghost with trust and seemingly anger issues, Dream is being driven mad by the boy he killed, and everyone is guilty yet blames anyone other than themselves.)Or as Dream said on the first day they spent together in the prison:" Everyone thinks they're right from their perspective and they will do anything to prove it and force their point of view onto others."
Relationships: Cara | CaptainPuffy & TommyInnit, Clay | Dream & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Dream SMP Ensemble & TommyInnit, Jack Manifold & TommyInnit, Ranboo & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Sam | Awesamdude & TommyInnit, Technoblade & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Toby Smith | Tubbo & TommyInnit, Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
Comments: 7
Kudos: 303
Collections: Completed stories I've read, Dream SMP Fics (Mainly Tommyinnit (Yeah I'm That Bitch))





	Payback is a bitch.

**Author's Note:**

> TW: Mentions of Character Death, Self-Hatred, Depression, PTSD, Trauma, Depictions of Canon-Typical Violence, Implied Paranoia, Emotional Manipulation, or more.
> 
> TW are there for a reason, so please be careful while reading and stay safe :)
> 
> For context: When Tommy died, he didn't go to the in-between or even hell, instead he became a ghost, similar to Ghostbur yet different in the fact that what he mostly feels are negative feelings and bad and unreliable memories. He decides to haunt Dream and make him suffer cuz now he can't be stopped lollll  
> PLEASE REMEMBER: TOMMY IS AN UNRELIABLE NARRATOR IN THIS, NOT EVERYTHING HE THINKS OR FEELS IS JUSTIFIED, THOUGH THEY ARE VALID. As I said, he only remembers the bad and not the good, unlike Wilbur's ghost, so while his feelings are valid, they are unreliable, and mostly it's misdirected anger towards the end.  
> 

**_« NOW THAT INTERSTATE IS PAVED WITH MEMORIES- »_ **

« Do you ever fucking shut up ??!! »

Tommy continues, pretending not to hear.

**« OF A PAST LIFE I LIVED WHEN I WAS EIGHTEEN-not that you know, I ever got to be eighteen- »**

Dream glares at him. Tommy grins, an evil glint in his eyes, and keeps going.

**« AND EVERY WINTER I THINK OF WHAT WE USED TO BE- »**

If he could, Tommy is sure that Dream would kill him again. But the thing is-

The thing is that Tommy is already _dead._ He died in this very same cell that Dream is still stuck in-despite claiming every few hours that he'd soon escape(quite frankly Tommy doubts it, but _whatever-_ )a few days ago. His blood is still there, etched onto the obsidian blocks. (If Tommy was honest, he'd admit that the sight leaves him nauseous, that it brings back feelings( ~~memories-~~ ) of panic, of fear coursing through his veins, of his righteous anger(an anger that never seemed to leave him, that was always a constant in the days leading up to his death(sometimes, when he thinks back on it, Tommy is glad he died that day, that he never got to get out of the prison. The anger reminds him of Dream, of _a cold white porcelain mask staring at him in freezing rage, of « Sorry doesn't cut it Tommy » as TnT blows up everything he holds dear, everything he built for himself. It reminds him of the community house, as Dream kept yelling and yelling, never once stopping as he accused Tommy of seemingly everything wrong with the server, of being the cause of everyone's problems, always. (It reminds him of withers, of « I'M A PERSON-»)_

**_«_ _TWENTY HOURS, IN AN OLD VAN- »_**

(So no, he doesn't like the anger, and by that last day, the day he died, Tommy had been up in his neck in it. If he'd been let out that day, if Sam had listened to him, Tommy doesn't know what he would have done. (He remembers threatening to beat the shit out of Sam the moment he was out, and quietly wonders if he'd had gone through it, had he been let out. On the good days, he likes to think he wouldn't have, that it had just been meaningless words thrown out in an attempt to make Sam help him, though it was a piss poor attempt now that he thinks back on it. They'd just been words after all, and Tommy isn't a bad person. Maybe he'd have hit Sam once(out of a feeble attempt at revenge, no matter how misdirected it was) and maybe he'd have joked(not really)about suing Sam(never once going through with it-), and maybe he'd have cried at finally being out of that place, but surely he wouldn't have gone as far as to hurt someone who meant so much to him right ?) 

(On the bad days though- when all he can feel is the blood wetly running down the side of his face, when his eye and cheeks keep throbbing with phantom pain, when he catches sight of the blood in his hair anytime he's floating near the water sink(blood that will never wash out, that will never disappear, because Tommy's _dead and_ he's a ghost now, and there's _nothing he can do about it-),_ when all he can feel is the _mounting anger still_ , the _rage_ and the _hate and the fear and the despair and the overwhelming fury at being left here to die with the man he despises the most-_

**_« UP THE EAST COAST, THROUGH THE COLD WIND- »_ **

_When the dark obsidian seems to be creeping closer and closer, and the cell getting smaller and smaller, and the feeling of loneliness and betrayal sets in and overwhelms him and doesn't_ go away-

_When all he can hear is Dream's taunts and his yelling and his words (words that are seared into his brain like they were branded there by the heat of a melting iron, words he can never forget-)_

_When all he can think about is the fact that Sam lied, that the creeper hybrid would rather let him rot in here until he finds the issue with his oh so beloved prison(Tommy barely stops himself from eye-rolling), that despite all his offers and promises, his kindness and the fact that Tommy trusted him even though he knew better, even though Dream(and Techno and Phil and Wilbur and Schlatt and even Tubbo-)_ taught him better _. Tommy had trusted Sam to keep him safe from Dream(_ _ ~~Sam had promised--~~_ _) and instead all, when the time came to keep true to his words, all he'd heard were the retreating footsteps of Sam as he walked away from the cell(_ ~~from Tommy~~ _\---), leaving him trapped with the one person he said he would protect him from, the one person he feared and despised the most._

**_« FOOT ON THE BRAKE AT THE LIGHT, I DON'T NOTICE- »_ **

_Sam had intended to keep him here forever(_ _ ~~no he hadn't-~~_ _), and nothing would have happened, not until he acted, not until he embraced what he'd become under Dream's influence, what he’d_ _ ~~maybe~~_ _been all along, what he would have had to become if he ever hoped to see the light of the sun again._ Not until he gave in to Dream _._ _ ~~(Tommy wouldn't ever-~~_ _.)_ _ ~~(Would he...?)~~_

_Tommy knows that Sam had wanted him set free(_ _~~had he?~~ _ _), but he also knows that it did not happen. He knows that 2 years of bad blood laced with war and betrayal_ _~~(it wasn't Sam's fault-~~ _ _) is thick and viscous and Tommy had been drowning in it, and in the state that he'd been in, he fears that a month of kindness from a stranger(_ _~~notastrangernotastrangernOTASTRANGER)~~ _ _who promised him everything and offered him nothing_ _~~(lieslieslies)~~ _ _simply wouldn't have been enough to make up for it._

So yes, Tommy likes to think he is a good person, or at least that he's better than Dream _._

_But on those bad days, he wonders if those were genuinely just empty words, just empty threats-)_

_(_ _~~On those bad days he thinks that maybe they weren't~~ _ _)_

_~~(On those days, Tommy feels like he's no different from Dream after all. He hates it. So instead he shoves everything into the deepest corners of his mind and tries his best not to look at the walls painted in his blood, turns away from Dream's knowing and smug smile, faces away from the red-tinted water inside the sink because he'd rather die again, he'd rather disappear entirely from this world than to be the person he's become in Dream's presence- than to be like Dream himself)~~ _

**_«I SIT AND WAIT UNTIL THE NEXT SONG- »_ **

(Instead, he sings and shouts louder and floats up towards the ceiling where Dream cannot reach him( _not that Dream can hurt him anymore, he's a ghost and everything passes through him now so Dream can do nothing but listen, listen as Tommy tries to drive him up a wall-_ he muses, a mischievous and evil glint glimmering in his eyes))

The thing is-

-Dream killed him, punched him until he was nothing but a writhing mess on the floor-

 _~~He can still remember the pain-~~ _

-cracked his head on the wall until blood and brain matter splattered against it-

_~~He thinks he might see a dent where his head tried to carve itself onto the floor-~~ _

-beat him down until his chest cavity gave in-

_~~He has trouble breathing in sometimes, when the phantom pain comes back and all he can hear is the sound Dream's knuckles make when they come down violently on his body, as if Dream was trying to reshape his chest bare-handedly-~~ _

-all the while the bastard _laughed,_ a _chilling and childish laugh, childlike glee etched into his eyes_ _ ~~, like he wasn't in the process of murdering someone, like he wasn't trying to mold out Tommy's lungs out his body-~~_

_(Tommy died at his hands, alone and forsaken in the most secure cell of an unbreachable prison, left here by someone he trusted and considered a friend-_

_He died with no one but his murderer and abuser for company after a week of constant manipulation attempts and isolation, stuck within nightmare-inducing walls that kept getting smaller, with no way to tell how much time had passed, whether he was any closer to getting out or not-_

_He'd begged and pleaded, he'd screamed and yelled, and yet no one came._

_Tommy died alone, even though he wasn't meant to, even though he never thought he would have to-)_

And so what choice did he have as a ghost stuck in the mortal plane other than to haunt and torment his murderer for the rest of his life?

**_« TWENTY HOURS IN AN OLD VAN- »_ **

(Sure, Tommy could leave. Something about being a ghost was that he could travel through walls as though they weren't there, and he could leave and never come back. He could go see Tubbo and dick around with him, he could check on Jack to make sure the idiot didn't run his hotel into the ground, he could visit Puffy and make sure the poor woman didn't lose sleep over him, he could visit that bitch of a totem hybrid and scare the shit out him and laugh mockingly at him. He could go and steal from ~~the Bla~~ _Technoblade_ without the bitch being able to do anything about it. He could visit Phil and Ghostbur and he could rope Ranboo into pranking them and he _could-_

_and he could---_

_He could do_ so many things.

But the thing was, the hard truth was-

None of them tried to help him. None of them had been worried. None of them had thought that maybe, just _maybe,_ leaving the PTSD riddled and claustrophobic 16 year old in a small cell with the man who tried his _hardest_ to get him under his thumb, who _lied and manipulated and abused and killed the teen(_ _ ~~thrice might he had-)~~_ _,_ wasn't their brightest idea.)

**_« UP THE EAST COAST, THROUGH THE COLD WIND- »_ **

(Tommy remembers the way they'd been laughing around, joyous and unconcerned, _uncaring_ in the few hours between his death and the moment it had been announced to them. 

None of them had been concerned about him. Worried about him.

And even when they learned, when they were told, they'd dismissed it or laughed it off, like the simple idea of the man who killed him twice, killing him a third time was a bad joke.)

_~~(Tommy hadn't either-)~~ _

**_« DROVE TWENTY HOURS BY THE OCEAN- »_ **

_(The thing was-_

_No one had been worried. No one had tried to help, or if they had, Tommy hadn't seen it._

_No one had come, and nobody had cared, and if nobody cared then that means he never really mattered to them in the first place, and if he never really mattered then what would be the point in doing anything else but staying and making sure that at least his murderer got it as bad as Tommy did really?)_

_(Who else would make sure that the bastard truly got what he deserved if not for TommyInnit himself?_

Because what consequences did Tommy's death have, really? Dream was already in prison and living out his worst possible life under Tommy's loud taunts and jeers, starved for food and kept away from everyone else. The only thing that was different from before his death was that he was no longer fed as much-it was all that could be changed really( ~~unless Sam planned to kill him but Tommy doubted it-)~~

What would be the point in Tommy visiting people who betrayed him left and right, people who never trusted him or liked him, who found him too annoying or too loud, who thought he was either too much or not enough( ~~never just enough-~~ )?

_Why would he bother reassuring people that his death wasn't their fault when they were the ones who left him to rot in the first place? When they never gave him an ounce of positive attention prior to his death, in exile, after doomsday and the final fight, back when all he'd wanted was someone to help him, someone he could trust, someone to tell him he wasn't alone-_

**(Dream throws a potato at him.**

**It phases through and he keeps going, louder than before.)**

**_« UP THE EAST COAST, WHAT A ROADTRIP- »_ **

_~~Let them build memorials in his name, let them raise statues and plant flowers.~~ _

_~~Let them drown in their guilt and seethe in the injustice that was his death until it's all they feel.~~ _

_~~Let them turn on each other and look for someone else to blame, someone else to hold accountable.~~ _

_(Because it's never their fault is it? No, it's never their fault and now that Tommy is gone, now that he's dead and they can't push the blame for this one onto him, they're looking for another victim, another scapegoat, because God Forbid they all take responsibility for once and admit that all of them had at least a bit of a hand in it. The moment they do that is the moment they accept that maybe everything bad that happened hadn't been his fault after all, and it's the moment they drown and die in their guilt and regrets because it means that all of them had pushed him towards his sure and definite death, and we can't have that can we?_

As Dream said on the first day of their unwilling stay together in the prison:" Everyone thinks they're right from their perspective and they will do anything to prove and force their point of view onto others."

_Tommy had disagreed back then. He finds out that he still does.)_

**(Dream yells at him. Tommy grins and throws more passion into it.)**

_**« TWENTY HOURS IN AN OLD FORD- »** _

TommyInnit( _The ghost-_ ) now is nothing more but a construct of what they used to see him as in their mind, and what they made him to be is a cruel and selfish boy who doesn't care about others, who only thinks for himself and never anyone else-

(Tommy is dead, and he's tired, oh so tired, and if they think of him as a monster, as a terrible evil, then what choice does he have really than to become one?)

(What does it matter that they changed their mind? What does it matter that they suddenly care, now that he's now dead and it's too late?)

And so he will do nothing but watch as they fight between themselves, and he will laugh hollowly because they're too late, they're too late and they can't do anything about it.

_**« 'CROSS THE MIDWEST, THINKING, "WHAT FOR?"- »** _

_Tommy will watch, a cold glint in his faded blue eyes, and he will let them drown in their guilt, in their helplessness and their sadness-_

_~~-they did nothing but watch, back when he needed them, they laughed and jeered at him, claimed he was but a liar and an attention-seeker when all he wanted was a helping hand to guide him back towards the right path, to tell him he would be alright, to help him-~~ _

_~~-and so Tommy will treat them the way they treated him, he will watch and laugh and turn his back on them-~~ _

_-and he will do_ _nothing.)_

** Dream tried to swim into lava. **

**Tommy closes his eyes, takes a breath, and sings the next lyrics to the damned song even louder.**

_**« DROVE TWENTY HOURS, BUT IT'S HOPELESS- »** _

**Dream respawns and falls down into the water. Tommy just keeps going, hands behind his back, trying to make his posture seem as innocent and non-threatening as possible.**

_**« 'CROSS THE MIDWEST, WHAT A ROADTRIP- »** _

_Yeah, so he enjoys it quite a bit, this whole 'drive Dream into madness' goal he set for himself,_ he thinks, _so sue him._

**The song ends. Dream breathes a sigh of relief.**

**Tommy takes a deep breath and starts back at the beginning.**

**_« NOW THAT INTERSTATE IS PAVED WITH MEMORIES- »_ **

**Payback is a bitch.**

**Author's Note:**

> My first fic and its about angsty block men lol  
> If you enjoyed pls leave a comment and kudos :)  
> Also english is not my main language, so if you see any mistakes(grammar, verb tense...) pls don't hesitate to tell me!


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